Mywebsearch toolbar - What it is and how to remove it

What is "My Web Search"?

My Web Search, also known as the My Way Speedbar, is the Internet Explorer toolbar part of the Fun Web Products suite of utilities such as Smiley Central, Cursor Mania, My Mail Stationary and the My Way website portal, amongst others.

This toolbar allows you to easily access search engine results and it gives you a 404 error redirector called My Total Search.

None of these products claim to be spyware but they do slow down your computer. All of the products use cookies to track usage, but they all claim not to use cookies or anything else to track identifiable information. My Web Search is found by most spyware removal tools, suck as Spybot Search and Destroy and Lavasoft Ad-Aware.

How to find out if you have My Web Search installed

If you run the program Hijackthis, you will notice the following lines:

R3 - URLSearchHook: (no name) - {00A6FAF6-072E-44cf-8957-5838F569A31D} - C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\SrchAstt\1.bin\MWSSRCAS.DLL

O2 - BHO: MyWebSearch Search Assistant BHO - {00A6FAF1-072E-44cf-8957-5838F569A31D} - C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\SrchAstt\1.bin\MWSSRCAS.DLL

O2 - BHO: mwsBar BHO - {07B18EA1-A523-4961-B6BB-170DE4475CCA} - C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\bar\1.bin\MWSBAR.DLL

O3 - Toolbar: My &Web Search - {07B18EA9-A523-4961-B6BB-170DE4475CCA} - C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\bar\1.bin\MWSBAR.DLL

O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [MyWebSearch Email Plugin] C:\PROGRA~1\MYWEBS~1\bar\1.bin\mwsoemon.exe

O4 - HKCU\..\Run: [MyWebSearch Email Plugin] C:\PROGRA~1\MYWEBS~1\bar\1.bin\mwsoemon.exe

O4 - Startup: MyWebSearch Email Plugin.lnk = C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\bar\1.bin\MWSOEMON.EXE

O4 - Global Startup: MyWebSearch Email Plugin.lnk = C:\Program Files\MyWebSearch\bar\1.bin\MWSOEMON.EXE

O8 - Extra context menu item: &Search - http://bar.mywebsearch.com/menusearch.html?p=ZWYYYYYYYYUS

O16 - DPF: {1D4DB7D2-6EC9-47A3-BD87-1E41684E07BB} - http://ak.imgfarm.com/images/nocache/funwebproducts/ei/MyWebSearchInitialSetup1.0.0.8-2.cab

How to remove My Web Search

First step is to uninstall the My Web Search option from Add/Remove Programs:

1. Click on Start, Settings, Control Panel
2. Double click on Add/Remove programs
3. Find "My Web Search" in the list of installed programs and click on Change/Remove to uninstall it. If you find any of the following programs from the Fun Web Products suite you might want to uninstall them too:
   • My Web Search (Smiley Central of FWP product as applicable)
   • My Way Speedbar (Smiley Central or other FWP as applicable)
   • My Way Speedbar (AOL and Yahoo Messengers) (beta users only)
   • My Way Speedbar (Outlook, Outlook Express, and IncrediMail)
   • Search Assistant - My Way
4. Reboot your computer and run Hijackthis
5. With HijackThis, scan for and fix any of the entries shown above that may be remaining.
6. Next, open My Computer, Drive C, and double-click on the Program Files folder
7. Right-click and delete the folders for:
   • FunWebProducts
   • MyWebSearch
8. MyWebSearch should now be completely uninstalled from your computer.
9. There will be some minor registry entries left behind by the uninstall, however these can be cleaned up by running SpyBot Search and Destroy or Ad-Aware SE or left alone.